


Separation Anxiety

by JoAsakura



Series: Armour [3]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-10
Updated: 2012-09-10
Packaged: 2017-11-13 23:49:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/509099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoAsakura/pseuds/JoAsakura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaidan doesn't like it when Shepard splits up the team.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Separation Anxiety

**Author's Note:**

> Armour pr0n - that's just how it goes, sometimes XD

A routine mission to rescue a bunch of stranded Exo-Geni scientists from a gelid ice-pit garbage world with the Reapers breathing down their necks had turned into a battle on two fronts.

Kaidan had taken the tech team - himself, Tali, and Liara - to disable and datamine the Cerberus base EDI had discovered on the far side of the planet while Shepard, Vega and Javik were fighting their way through a howling storm and a horde of Reaper scouts to get to the scientists and evacuate them.

"I don't like this." Kaidan said, picking off a centurion. The armoured man's smoke grenades went off as he fell, like a dying squid pissing ink into the water. "Shepard having to split us up."

"Don't be a bosh'tet, Kaidan." Tali muttered as she hacked the systems. "At least you're here. Garrus is going crazy stuck up on the Normandy. But Shepard's never leaving them undefended again, not after the Collectors." She shuddered.

"Yeah, I've heard about what you guys went through on the Collector Base. And then there was Virmire. And then.. and then Desponia.. him all alone in the dark while Garrus and Steve and I were stuck up top. I'm telling you, NOTHING good comes of having to split up the strike teams." Kaidan growled, using his biotics to yank a scurrying phantom off her feet and into Liara's waiting singularity field. "I know he worries, and I just.."

"Kaidan." Liara said gently as she detonated the field, the phantom screaming as she fell to the ground. "It sounds like the one who's mostly worried is you." The Cerberus assassin struggled to her feet and Liara frowned, squeezing off a round that scattered black blood and reapertech across the floor. "I think I would call it separation anxiety."

Kaidan opened his mouth to reply, then snapped it shut with a scowl. 

He hated when Liara was right.

~~

Kaidan chewed on the idea as they took the second shuttle back. The thought of Shepard in the cold and the dark without him... he didn't like it. Just thinking about it made him anxious.

EDI had informed them that the other team, nearly frostbitten and exhausted, had safely made it back with a group of terrified scientists not more than ten minutes before, and Shepard had ordered the ship to the Citadel as soon as Kaidan's team was aboard.

"EDI, where's Shepard now?" Kaidan asked as they exited the shuttle. The crew was bundling the scientists in blankets and shuffling them off to medbay, and James was cursing over the frozen joints in his armour. He saw Shepard's hardsuit components in their cubbies as the diagnostic VIs checked them over, but his undersuit wasn't in diagnostic. His fatigues were still hanging up, but the hoodie was gone. Which meant Shepard had grabbed it and left in a hurry.

Kaidan fretted. "He in his cabin?"

"Shepard is in engineering. Engineer Adams had an emergency issue he needed to discuss with the Commander." EDI purred, opening up the storage access-way. "Quicker than the lift at the moment."

"Thanks EDI." Kaidan vaguely waved towards EDI's voice and stepped into the storage rooms. Stairs led up to engineering, and it would have been just a quick jog, if Shepard wasn't already just sitting there in the dull red light, head in his hands, and huddled down into his well-worn jacket.

"Shepard?" Kaidan asked as the door shushed closed behind him. "John?"

He looked up, rubbing his hand back through the close crop of his hair, pale eyes weary. "Adams says we have thermal venting issue with the drive core. I have to see if Steve can't track us down the parts, since supply lines are fucked right now." He sighed.

"Are you ok?" Kaidan asked, armoured fingers stroking Shepard's face as he crouched beside him. He knew it was his own anxiety talking. But Shepard *was* paler than normal. Pale as he'd been since he'd collapsed after the Leviathan. 

The Commander started to protest, but the words died out into a grunt as he leaned into Kaidan's touch, eyes sliding closed. "Tired. Cold." He finally said. "Tired of being cold." He rubbed his face against Kaidan's palm, stubble rasping against the heavy polymer weave of the Major's gauntlet. 

Kaidan wanted to kiss him, touch him. Reassure them both that they were warm and safe and ok. But he found himself mesmerised by the soft scrape of Shepard's jaw in his hand, the way the red light barely added any flush to his pallid skin.

They sat like that, in silence for long minutes before Shepard pushed himself to standing. "Come on, you can tell me how your mission went, upstairs." He turned to head back up the stairs, but Kaidan caught him, the spell broken.

"Shepard." Kaidan said, very softly against the edge of Shepard's ear. "I was worried about you." The commander shivered in a way that had nothing to do with the cold as Kaidan nosed through the soft hair on the back of Shepard's neck, breathing the scent of ozone and leather that was so uniquely his. Even with Cerberus' techniques, the scar tissue around the jack never quite healed right on a human biotic, but it was always sensitive. Kaidan's lips traced the edge of the hard ridge of scar, and Shepard hissed a breath in sharply.

"Kaidan.." he said hoarsely, pressing his back against the Major's armoured chest. "Do you really want to do this here?" He dropped his head back, pupils wide in his pale eyes as he searched Kaidan's face.

In reply, Kaidan brought his hand under Shepard's chin, tipping his head back even further. Shepard came up on his toes, as Kaidan's gloved fingers splayed across his throat and Kaidan could feel Shepard's pulse throbbing through the suit haptics as he kissed him.

It was a harsh kiss, harsher than Kaidan had intended. One full of worry and possessive need, even as he let his other hand slide down Shepard's chest, dragging the undersuit's zipper open to his navel.

"Yes. I think I do want to do this here." Kaidan said when they broke for air. "Are you worried? About an audience?" He pushed the zipper down further, dragging his fingers down the plane of Shepard's stomach and under the thin black cotton of his boxers. Shepard was already hard, bucking gently against Kaidan's hand even as he craned his head back, reaching for another kiss.

"Adams is right upstairs, and Steve and James are through that door." Shepard murmured against Kaidan's jaw. The Major stroked the long line of Shepard's throat with one hand as he stroked his shaft with the other. 

"The I guess we better be quiet." Kaidan whispered back, letting Shepard go. He turned, blinking owlishly, confused before Kaidan crushed him against the bulkhead. 

Caught between the warm, hard shell of the major's hardsuit, and the unforgiving, cold curve of the bulkhead, Shepard wrapped his arms around Kaidan's neck, hips grinding his cock against the Major's armoured groin.

"You do remember you're a screamer, right?" Kaidan joked, palming the back of Shepard's head to protect him as he ground right back, letting Shepard ride his thigh as they kissed. 

"I'm not the one talking too much, Major." Shepard grinned back fiercely. A flush had crept across his face, the faint sheen of sweat on his forehead. He gasped, fingers digging gouges into Kaidan's shoulderplates as he worked himself against Kaidan's armour with his other hand. "God.. K.. don't.. please..please don't let.."

Kaidan's hand tightened on Shepard's waist and he held him fast. "I won't let you go, I promise, John. It's ok. It's ok." He said quickly, softly as Shepard came against the ridges of his abdominal plates, white oozing down the scarred blue metal. He kissed Shepard's face, his mouth, "I'm not leaving you alone again."


End file.
